Living Here: a map of songs—Theater review by Chris Kompanek
Part monologue, song cycle and site-specific ode to the road, Gideon Irving’s Living Here: a map of songs bursts with a boundless desire to explore the expanses of the globe and befriend the singular characters who inhabit it. The self-proclaimed “21st-century troubadour” has performed more than 500 shows in just as many homes across the U.S. and in New Zealand.
Barefoot and in a suit with suspenders, he weaves anecdotes about his hosts—including a Colorado man who runs a potato-sorting facility with ties to the Mexican mafia—in the spaces between frenzied folk songs written for a range of instruments. The particularly inspired “6am” blends a ringtone seamlessly into the accompaniment as it peers into the imagined future of a billionaire’s iPhone-obsessed son. Content dictates form again in “A Little More Love,” in which he plays guitar, banjo and bouzouki almost simultaneously to illustrate the song’s heartfelt and humorous plea to be able to squeeze more time out of life.—Christopher Kompanek
Various locations (see Off Broadway). Written and performed by Gideon Irving. Running time: 1hr 20mins. No intermission.

Queen of the Night. Diamond Horseshoe at the Paramount Hotel (see Off Broadway). By Randy Weiner. Directed by Christine Jones. With ensemble cast. Running time: 3hrs. No intermission.
Queen of the Night: In brief
Nightlife impresario Randy Weiner refashions the old Diamond Horseshoe Nightclub (below the Paramount Hotel) into a wild hotchpotch of food, drink, circus, theater and dance. The cast of 33, directed by Tony-winning designer Christine Jones, includes Katherine Crockett as the ball's hostess and Steve Cuiffo as a magician.
Queen of the Night: Theater review by Adam Feldman
Divine decadence is on the table at Queen of the Night, an almost absurdly deluxe dinner-circus-nightlife experience by immersive-theater king Randy Weiner. Set in the Paramount Hotel’s gorgeously refurbished Diamond Horseshoe nightclub—shuttered since 1951—the show takes the form of a grand party held by the Marchesa (Katherine Crockett, an elegant dancer). Designed and directed by Christine Jones, it borrows vague themes from The Magic Flute; there is also a continual swirl of circus elements by Shana Carroll, of the neocirque troupe Les 7 Doigts de la Main (several alums of which are in the ensemble).
Attractive performers take you aside for interactive micro-adventures; lissome acrobats perform on the very banquettes at which you feast on things like lobster and suckling pig. It’s not unlike a cruise-ship version of Eyes Wide Shut, but in a pleasantly indulgent way. If it rarely seems quite like

[Note: Since this review was written, Then She Fell has moved and reopened; it now plays on three floors of a church building in Williamsburg.]
At first blush, Then She Fell seems to be a small-scale cribbing of Punchdrunk’s Sleep No More. Yes, you wander solo through intricately dressed rooms in a creepy building; yes, that man in a cravat is crawling up the wall in front of you. But you begin to realize that Third Rail Projects’ interactive riff on Lewis Carroll’s Alice books is using a similar language to give you a different experience: When you peer into the looking glass, it stares right back at you.
Performed in the former Greenpoint Hospital, the show only permits 15 audience members a pop—making for a distinctly intimate experience. You’re given a shot of mulled wine and a set of keys before nurses, Carroll characters and even the psychotropic author himself usher you through a combination Wonderland–psych ward. As in Sleep No More, no two individuals will have the same evening. You may find yourself taking dictation for the Hatter (the mesmerizing Elizabeth Carena), painting cream-colored roses red with the White Rabbit (Tom Pearson) or sitting down to the infamous tea party with the whole gang.
The experiences that director-designer-mastermind Zach Morris and his company offer are stunningly personal. You don’t have a mask to hide behind here—when you peep in on the Red Queen (Rebekah Morin) having a private breakdown, she catches you watching through the two-way m

Posterity: Theater review by David Cote
It would be tempting to say that Doug Wright, fashioning a play around Henrik Ibsen in his final years, has unavoidably penned an Ibsenian drama. Sure, the piece has qualities you find in the Norwegian titan’s middle and late periods: moral rot seeping out of bourgeois closets, the struggle between an old master and an impatient youth, and the spectacle of a great man in the shadow of death. But Posterity also contains something you don’t see much in Ibsen: affection and respect between male rivals. The play might be called Paternity, so consumed is it with fathers and sons.
Wright (I Am My Own Wife) directs his own work with a nice balance of pomp (David Van Tieghem’s booming fanfares, sepulchral lighting by David Lander) and earthy sass (a comic vibe that dominates the first half). The plot rolls on two tracks: In the first, budding sculptor Gustav Vigeland (Linklater, a rumpled bundle of insecurity and arrogance) is pressured into executing a bust of aged literary lion Ibsen (Noble, touchingly vain yet haunted), who will have none of it. The subplot turns on Vigeland’s apprentice (Mickey Theis) and a cleaning woman (marvelous Dale Soules) who model for the artist and find their own road to immortality. There are roughly three generations of artists in the piece, and death stalks two of them.
Wright lets his characters pontificate and bloviate­—particularly Ibsen when he finds himself cornered by the alternately fawning and irritated

Small Mouth Sounds: Theater review by Jenna Scherer
Though it employs very little dialogue, there’s nothing quiet about Small Mouth Sounds. Bess Wohl’s luminous new play uses silence to dig into the core of human pain, which, like everything unendurable, can also be very funny. Set over the course of a New Agey upstate retreat, the play follows six city dwellers who are each locked up inside their own private misery. It’s a silent retreat, which makes communication at once much easier and much harder than it would be if words were allowed.
Director Rachel Chavkin, who’s demonstrated her flair for excess and romance in the wonderful Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, proves that she’s every bit as up to the task of minimalist realism with this minutely realized production. The devil is in the details, and the excellent ensemble speaks volumes with a long look or the frantic unwrapping of a hard candy. The play asks—and admirably never quite answers—deep questions about how we connect with other people, a feat that the characters achieve through channels both profound and silly. Wohl isn’t afraid to let the ridiculous rub up against the sublime, and it makes Small Mouth Sounds as entertaining as it is transcendent.—Jenna Scherer
Ars Nova (see Off Broadway). By Bess Wohl. Directed by Rachel Chavkin. With ensemble cast. Running time: 1hr 40mins. No intermission.

Fuerza Bruta: Wayra. Daryl Roth Theatre (see Off Broadway). Conceived and directed by Diqui James. With ensemble cast. Running time: 1hr 20mins. No intermission.
Wayra: In brief
Fuerza Bruta returns in the third installment of the De La Guarda trilogy. If it's anything like the first two, you can expect a visually impressive dance-rave thrill ride that merges striking imagery with techno music and aerial showboating.
Wayra: Theater review by David Cote
When the sensory-wraparound rave known as De La Guarda swung into town 16 years ago, it was the only show of its kind. Even in 2007, when environmental-kinesthetic mastermind Diqui James unveiled a sequel, Fuerza Bruta, there was no Sleep No More, Then She Fell or Queen of the Night. So has James tried to reinvent the wheel and beat the competition—say, by introducing narrative or literary allusions? Not a chance. Fuerza Bruta: Wayra is of a piece with its predecessors, still offering unique thrills for a remarkably young and diverse audience that, I’m guessing, doesn’t get to Playwrights Horizons very much.
And there’s nothing wrong with that. As a palate cleanser for theatergoers tired of living rooms and family secrets, Wayra is a bona fide thrill ride. Immersive theater may be more common now, but no one blasts through boundaries like these guys.
As usual, James’s nonverbal episodic spectacle (with an eclectic score by Gaby Kerpel that glides from techno and drum ’n’ bass to world) is a direct challenge to we poor critics’

Application Pending: Theater review by Diane Snyder
Application Pending isn’t a musical, but Christina Bianco is something akin to a one-woman orchestra. In Greg Edwards and Andy Sandberg’s deliciously twisted solo vehicle, the multivoiced wonder and Forbidden Broadway vet morphs into 43 personalities, creating a symphony of hilariously harmonious voices.
Although poking fun at the superrich and their oh-so-darling progeny is hardly uncharted territory, the satire has a spry freshness to it. Bianco's main character, the sympathetic Christine Evans, is the beleaguered new director of pre-primary admissions at an exclusive Manhattan prep school. On her first day on the job, she endures a barrage of insane and inane phone calls from entitled parents, annoying colleagues and other oddballs.
Under Sandberg’s direction, Bianco plays them all with gusto, switching personages with rapid-fire precision and vocal and physical adjustments. Some characters are cameo appearances—like those of George Clooney and a British GPS voice—but they span ages, genders, ethnicities and varying degrees of sanity.
There’s Jennica, a first-grade teacher whose ardor is aroused by her cutie-pie pupils; animal-rights activist Pat Hyman, who objects to the school’s beaver mascot; and the mother whose five-year-old has already earned raves for his performance in Chaim and the Chocolate Factory.
Edwards and Sandberg are wise not to stretch the premise beyond 75 minutes. Even wiser is the casting of a force

Hedwig and the Angry Inch. Belasco Theatre (see Broadway). Book by John Cameron Mitchell. Music and lyrics by Stephen Trask. Directed by Michael Mayer. With Neil Patrick Harris, Lena Hall. Running time: 1hr 40mins. No intermission.
Hedwig and the Angry Inch: In brief
The omnitalented Neil Patrick Harris plays the titular crotch-botched German rock singer in the first Broadway production of John Cameron Mitchell and Stephen Trask's genre-bending 1998 rock musical. Michael Mayer (Spring Awakening) directs.
Hedwig and the Angry Inch: Review by David Cote
Transitioning from child star to adult gay icon, sitcom prince and social-media wizard, Neil Patrick Harris always seemed to be a cultural rock star. But in his latest reinvention, it turns out that the actor is, y’know, an actual rock star. As the imperious, spurned, fright-bewigged, sweaty glitterbomb at the heart of Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Harris makes Broadway rock harder than it ever has before.
It’s tough to tell who’s the vehicle here—Hedwig or Harris? Is the celebrity using John Cameron Mitchell and Stephen Trask’s quintessential millennial hit to reboot an East Coast profile, or do the producers of prickly material need star wattage to sell its harsh, sticky truths about desire and damage? Let’s opt for symbiosis, one of the major obsessions of this magnificent monster: Harris and Hedwig are one.
In fact, its essential drama is derived from the splitting of one being into two, per Plato’s Symposium. In the ancient Gr

The Audience: Theater review by David Cote
The teen Elizabeth, fated to wear the crown and wield the scepter as Queen of England, hates her new digs at Buckingham Palace. “It’s like being trapped in a museum,” whines the unhappy girl. Contrast her experience with ours at Peter Morgan’s The Audience. For two hours, we watch a pageant of prime ministers, from Churchill to Cameron, in fictionalized weekly debriefs with their monarch. There’s a touch of waxworks about the piece. But you shouldn’t feel trapped, and anyway, museums can be nice, with pretty things to look at and facts to glean. Helen Mirren’s art of acting is certainly worth your close attention.
Exuding perfect regal frostiness while letting us glimpse the lonely person underneath, Mirren transforms brilliantly (helped by lightning-fast costume changes) from the grandmotherly 69-year-old comforting an insecure John Major (Dylan Baker) to the 25-year-old heir apparent nervously schooled by Winston Churchill (Dakin Matthews). Richard McCabe’s sly-boots Labour PM Harold Wilson teases her with obvious affection, and she nimbly defends herself against the fire-breathing Margaret Thatcher (Judith Ivey). The royals, the play notes, represent continuity in a changing world. Morgan’s data-crammed historical scrapbook equally points out that domestic and foreign problems recur with sad regularity—such as interfering in the Middle East (whether over the Suez Canal or Saddam Hussein’s WMDs) or relief for the poor.
Whether you

Hamilton: Theater review by David Cote
History ticks to a syncopated beat in Lin-Manuel Miranda’s jubilant, overflowingly rich Hamilton. And just as syncopation achieves its energizing effect by disturbing the expected flow, so Miranda’s biomusical on founding father Alexander Hamilton is a rhythm-and-rhyme intervention for American iconography and ideology. This populist throwdown to the way we tell our stories and spin our songs is about the Revolution, and it is a revolution: hip-hop grooves stuffed with political critique, heroes of color taking over the old house and throwing a party. You’re invited, but you’ve got to learn new moves.
Miranda based this epic-yet-personal pageant on Ron Chernow’s 2004 biography, which clued in the prodigious composer-lyricist to the fact that Hamilton was, as his opening lines have it, “a bastard, orphan, son of a whore and a / Scotsman, dropped in the middle of a forgotten / Spot in the Caribbean.” Casting himself in the title role, Miranda claims Hamilton for the immigrant dissident.
And yet the ambitious and brilliant young Hamilton emigrates north and becomes a successful lawyer, General Washington’s go-to aide and one of the Constitution’s most eloquent interpreters, all the while starting a family and weathering a sex scandal. Spoiler alert for the historically ignorant: It all crashes in 1804, when Hamilton agrees to a duel with then–Vice President Aaron Burr (Leslie Odom Jr.), a man who has felt scorned and outshined by Hamilton

A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder. Walter Kerr Theatre (see Broadway). Book and lyrics by Robert L. Freedman. Music and lyrics by Steven Lutvak. Directed by Darko Tresnjak. With Jefferson Mays, Bryce Pinkham, Lauren Worsham, Lisa O’Hare. Running time: 2hrs 20mins. One intermission.
A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder: in brief
The mercurial Jefferson Mays (Tony winner for I Am My Own Wife) plays multiple members of an aristocratic clan in this new musical by Steven Lutvak and Robert L. Freedman, based on the same novel that inspired Kind Hearts and Coronets. A distant and disinherited member of the D'Ysquith family slays his way to the earldom. Darko Tresnjak directs.
A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder: review by David Cote
Since it turns on the niceties of aristocratic succession, why not start the coronation early: A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder is the new undisputed king of musical comedy. Filled with lunatic sight gags and the wittiest, loveliest show tunes in years, there’s not a weak link in the lively cast, and Darko Tresnjak’s antic, cartoonish staging is ideal. But without a doubt, the jewel in GGLM’s crown is an eight-faceted gem: Jefferson Mays as a gargoylish gallery of doomed twits, snobs and prigs, members of the seriously inbred and outré D’Ysquith clan. These various scions and heirs must fall so that distantly related and mostly disinherited Monty Navarro (Pinkham) can rise.
Mays is a bloody comic genius (with an ace backstage costume crew

What You Will: Theater review by Sandy MacDonald
As if Shakespeare’s penchant for gender-bending weren’t challenge enough, Bedlam reassigns the dozen-odd roles of What You Will—its subtitular twist on Twelfth Night (which it performs, in a folksier version, on alternate nights)—to a mere five actors. Confused yet? You will be, but it’s all part of the fun.
The line grab permits gifted shape-shifter Andrus Nichols to toggle between the haughty countess Olivia and her brawling drunkard uncle, Sir Toby Belch. There’s no costume change: Looking like late–Joan Crawford with a savage slash of scarlet lipstick, Sir Toby retains the ’50s-style lace dress provided by Valérie T. Bart. Everyone’s dolled up in garden-party white, but they won’t remain pristine for long. That lipstick has a way of traveling mouth-to-mouth, and even the yellow of Malvolio’s infamous stockings, painted on by a properly snotty Edmund Lewis, won’t stay put. Newcomer Susannah Millonzi gives us a novel Maria (pinched and wonky), plus a touching Viola, whose first panicky utterance—“What country, friends, is this?”—sets the tone for emotional intensity.—Sandy MacDonald
Dorothy Strelsin Theatre (see Off Broadway). By William Shakespeare. Directed by Eric Tucker. With ensemble cast. Running time: 2hrs. No intermission.

Fish in the Dark: Theater review by David Cote
Checking out Larry David’s debut as a Broadway playwright and performer, I did not expect to be thinking of ancient Greek tragedy. Comedy, sure, but I figured past influences would stretch back to Allen, not Aeschylus. And yet here’s kvetchy urinal salesman Norman Drexel (David), bolting onstage after seeing his mother unconscious and naked in her bedroom, performing mute spasms of oedipal horror—face a gaping mask of shock; arms sawing the air in crazy, rigid patterns. Such ritual gestures would fit Athens circa 403 BCE, although I don’t think any Attic bard ever penned the plangent cry “You fucked my mother?!?”
Fish in the Dark may be new, but its comic ingredients are classically aged: horny old ladies, greedy relatives, philandering dads, luscious blonds and preposterous deceptions. The DNA has been passed down from Aristophanes to Plautus, Wycherley and sex farces popular on Broadway in the ’60s. David’s contribution is mainly to be himself, the everyputz he played on Curb Your Enthusiasm: cheerfully cynical, blithely petty and amazed that anyone should be offended by his honesty.
The tissue-thin plot of Fish concerns the dying wishes of Norman’s father (Jerry Adler), who wants mother Gloria (Jayne Houdyshell) to live with one of the sons. Norman is sure Pop meant her to go with brother Arthur (Ben Shenkman, a seething font of contempt). Arthur will have none of it. Rosie Perez shows up as a former cleaning lady with a secre

Theater review by Adam Feldman. Al Hirschfeld Theatre (Broadway). Book by Harvey Fierstein. Music and lyrics by Cyndi Lauper. Dir. Jerry Mitchell. With Stark Sands, Billy Porter, Annaleigh Ashford. 2hrs 20mins. One intermission.
The kicky crowd-pleaser Kinky Boots is the very model of a modern major musical. Adapted from a 2005 English indie film, Harvey Fierstein and Cyndi Lauper’s fizzy pop tuner tells of Charlie (the capable Sands) and his Northampton footwear factory, Price & Son—a family business in danger of closing down. Hope arrives in the unlikely form of Lola (Porter), a self-possessed drag queen with ideas for a niche product line: knee-high, skin-tight, stiletto-heeled sheaths of ostentatious color, strong enough for a man who’s made up like a woman. (Gay style and consumer dollars to the rescue! The shoe must go on!) Directed with verve by Jerry Mitchell, Kinky Boots feels familiar at every step, down to its messages about individuality, community, pride and acceptance; it could have been cobbled together from parts of The Full Monty, Billy Elliot and Fierstein’s La Cage aux Folles, and it culminates in a feel-good finale so similar to Hairspray’s (which Mitchell choreographed) that it might as well be called “You Can’t Stop the Boot.”
Yet the musical holds up for the same reason Price & Son’s products do: solid craftsmanship and care. Lauper is a musical-theater natural, combining bright, infectious melodies with simple but effective lyrics. As each act progress

Beautiful—The Carole King Musical. Stephen Sondheim Theatre. (see Broadway). Book by Douglas McGrath. Music and lyrics by Carole King, Gerry Goffin, Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil. Directed by Marc Bruni. With Jessie Mueller. Running time: 2hrs 30mins. One intermission.
Beautiful—The Carole King Musical: In brief
Recently minted Broadway star Jessie Mueller finally gets a vehicle specially crafted for her gorgeous voice and her innate warmth. She plays the great singer-songwriter Carole King in a retrospective about King's early life and career. Playwright Douglas McGrath provides the book.
Beautiful—The Carole King Musical: Theater review by David Cote
Beautiful—The Carole King Musical shares several virtues with its titular singer-songwriter, among them humility, earnestness and dedication to craft. If Douglas McGrath’s book never achieves the dramatic grit or comic zip of Jersey Boys, at least director Marc Bruni’s production avoids being a brain-dead, self-satisfied hit parade à la Berry Gordy’s Motown. Still, it does seem that stretches of Broadway’s newest jukebox musical consist of situations such as this: “Carole, you’ve got to write us a hit!” “I’ve written something.” “It’s a hit!” Yes, Beautiful loves its diligent, long-suffering pop genius, and invites you to do the same.
It’s quite an easy task when you have the phenomenal Jessie Mueller in the lead. The effortlessly appealing star cut her teeth on Broadway flops (the mis-reconceived On a Clear Day You Can See Fore

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. Ethel Barrymore Theatre (see Broadway). By Simon Stephens. Based on the book by Mark Haddon. Directed by Marianne Elliott. With Alex Sharp, Francesca Faridany. Running time: 2hrs 30mins. One intermission.
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time: In brief
Based on the 2003 best-seller about an autistic teen’s search for the killer of his neighbor’s pooch, this stage thriller comes to Broadway on a wave of acclaim from England. The adaptation is by the prolific Simon Stephens, and the spectacular staging is by Marianne Elliott (War Horse).
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time: Theater review by David Cote
Despite the Sherlock-derived title and gruesome crime scene it opens with, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time solves the case relatively quickly. By the end of the first act we know whodunit (that is, impaled a pooch with a pitchfork) and we’ve gotten another revelation, this one having to do with the hero’s mother. But there’s a broader mystery raised by this dazzling and pulse-pounding drama: “How on earth did they do that?”
By “that,” we mean how the British import translates Mark Haddon’s tricky 2003 novel—narrated by a 15-year-old boy who’s clearly on the autism spectrum—to the stage. Christopher John Francis Boone (Sharp) is a math savant with a fondness for the color red, who has difficulty interacting with people—he screams if you touch him. The strain of raising such a gifted but

On the Twentieth Century: Theater review by Adam Feldman
On the Twentieth Century is set on a high-speed 1930s luxury train from Chicago to New York, and it’s the vehicle Kristin Chenoweth has been waiting for all her life. La Cheno is one of the great Broadway stars of our time, but she has never had a role that cast so bright and sustained a light on her multifaceted talents, and the resulting shine is dazzling. All the powers stuffed into her tiny frame—the huge voice that rises from kazoo to coloratura soprano, the brash look-at-me confidence, the Carol Channing–esque precision clowning—are harnessed to propel the show forward. She’s the little engine that could do anything.
The 1978 musical itself is written in an affectionately arch style that combines comic operetta with farce and screwball sex-battle comedy. Adapted from the 1932 play by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur (and an earlier source by Bruce Millholland), it sounds like few other shows in recent musical-theater history: The action and the notes are at a higher pitch than we’re used to. Although the small orchestra can’t quite convey the sweep of the score, the cast of Scott Ellis’s swell revival has a grand time with Cy Coleman’s merrily frantic music and Betty Comden and Adolph Green’s clever libretto, a fizzy tribute to the delusional grandeur of old-time show business.
A grinning, swooping Peter Gallagher, in a cape and pin-striped suit, plays down-on-his-luck impresario Oscar Jaffee, bent on cajoling his

Theater review by David Cote. Shubert Theatre (see Broadway). Book by Dennis Kelly. Music and lyrics by Tim Minchin. Dir. Matthew Warchus. With ensemble cast. 2hrs 35mins. One intermission.
Adults are divided on the subject of children in the delectably sweet and nasty musical Matilda. Some, like the helicopter parents in the opening number, “Miracle,” dote on their spawn with gross expectation. At the opposite pole is Miss Agatha Trunchbull (Bertie Carvel), cruel headmistress of Crunchem Hall, who abuses her charges with terms such as maggot, worm and carbuncle—when she isn’t busy flinging them bodily about school grounds. Caught in the middle is Matilda, the gifted autodidact at the center of Roald Dahl’s wonderful 1988 novel and this joyful adaptation, buoyed by a sly, inventive score by Tim Minchin. Matilda’s a born genius, but this put-upon girl is also “a little bit naughty,” as she sings. You have to be to survive in her noisome, vulgar world.
Happily, Matilda (coproduced by the Royal Shakespeare Company and already a hit in London) follows its diminutive hero’s lead: It maintains a high level of cheeky mischief while hitting the requisite sentimental notes and a refreshing antiauthoritarian message. The final number, “Revolting Children,” plays on the notion that minors can be both repugnant and a source of social upheaval: “Revolting children / Living in revolting times / We sing revolting songs / Using revolting rhymes.” There’s a lesson for you tweens: You’ve inher

The Mystery of Love & Sex: Theater review by David Cote
It has been written by many a self-help author and even crooned by John Mayer: Love is a verb. Easy to say, harder to do. That paralyzing gulf between feeling and acting is one of the enigmas gently held up to the light in Bathsheba Doran’s wise and exquisitely crafted The Mystery of Love & Sex, a group portrait of four souls grappling with the vagaries of mutating desire. We in the West may be loping slowly toward a more liberated age of gender fluidity and sexual freedom, but that doesn’t make the course of love run any smoother.
Charlotte (Gayle Rankin) and Jonny (Mamoudou Athie) have been friends since childhood, neighbors in an unspecified Southern exurb whose differences weirdly seem to complete each other. He is African-American, droll but shy and devoutly Baptist; she is a secular Jew, voluble and impetuous, hurtling toward lesbianism. These best friends attend college together and drift sheepishly into a platonic quasi-affair. She suspects Jonny is closeted, but he insists he’s saving himself for marriage. They dance awkwardly. Naturally, they fall in love; what sort of love is unclear.
Despite my twee précis, Doran is not after a millennial rom-com with adorkable bi-curiosity and postracial frisson sprinkled to taste. She broadens her canvas to include older, if no wiser, adults: Charlotte’s parents, Howard (Tony Shalhoub) and Lucinda (Diane Lane). Just as Doran sketches her younger characters with the right am

Honeymoon in Vegas: Theater review by David Cote
How to answer snobs who denounce Broadway as a cultural wasteland of gaudy lights, musical cheese and tacky titillation, a place where suckers from around the world flock to get fleeced? You could say at least it’s not…Las Vegas? Well, the Great White Way has now become Sodom of the Southwest, and whatever happens there is definitely not staying there: Honeymoon in Vegas is too damn fun to keep secret.
Jason Robert Brown’s big and brassy score borrows gleefully from the obvious sources—Sinatra, Mancini and Liberace—and splices that swingin’ lounge vibe with his own bouncy, wryly neurotic voice. For those who loved and mourned The Bridges of Madison County last season, they know Brown as a serious composer-lyricist who writes keenly about passion and loneliness. So it’s a thrill to see his musical craft and depth in the service of so much splendid silliness.
Because let’s face it: Andrew Bergman’s book, which hews closely to the bones of his 1992 screenplay, is goofy stuff. Dead-mother–haunted Jack (Rob McClure) tries to end his fear of commitment by running off with patience-tested fiancée Betsy (adorable Brynn O’Malley) for a quickie marriage in Vegas. Cardsharp Tommy Korman (Tony Danza) is struck by Betsy’s resemblance to his dead wife and schemes to steal her away from Jack via a high-stakes poker game. Most of the laughs turn on deceased monster moms and fatally suntanning wives, with the female lead treated as an IOU. Femi